


Brotherly Advice

by queerlyobscure (softestpunk)



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-07
Updated: 2012-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-29 03:32:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/315349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softestpunk/pseuds/queerlyobscure
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After meeting a handsome doctor who may or may not have agreed to share rooms with him, Holmes goes to his brother to lament his behaviour in front of him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Brotherly Advice

“I think I may have made an idiot of myself,” Holmes sighed as he sank down on the opposite side of his brother's desk.

Mycroft raised an eyebrow and poured two measures of brandy, “that sounds most unlike you, Sherlock. I suppose this has to do with the gentleman you met earlier today,” he slid one of the glasses across the table, “a doctor, if I'm not very much mistaken.”

Holmes smiled wryly and swallowed his brandy in one go, “you know you aren't, though given that I run into doctors on a daily basis, I fail to be impressed.”

“You are sulking, Sherlock. It is most unbecoming,” Mycroft poured another measure into his brother's glass, “very well, tell me all about him.”

Hard as he tried to conceal it, Holmes knew that Mycroft had seen the way his features lit up. “His name is John Watson. He's just returned from the war in Afghanistan; he was injured, and then deathly ill,” he sipped at his brandy more politely this time.

Mycroft nodded and sipped at his own glass, “attractive gentleman, I take it?”

“Very much so. So much so, in fact, that I spent our entire meeting babbling like damned fool. I'm sure he thinks me quite insane. I imagine he might consent to share rooms with me out of pity.”

“Ah, so you have been successful in your search for a suitable flatmate. Congratulations.”

“Thank you. Though after my performance today, I cannot say I am as pleased as you are about it.” Holmes drew a hand down his face and then pinched the bridge of his nose, “any other day, any other time, I could easily have presented myself as an intelligent, amiable person with perhaps a few charming eccentricities, but the second I encounter a pretty face, any semblance of being if not normal, then at least not bound for Bedlam, flies out the window. Blood detection indeed.”

“That is the way of the world, Sherlock. If we were all capable of charming a prospective lover from the first, love itself would be a damned sight less exciting.”

“Mycroft!” Holmes looked up at his brother in shock, “when did I say anything about a prospective lover?”

Mycroft smirked, but not nastily, “you lost your head over an attractive army doctor. Lean fellow, broad shoulders, well-kept moustache? You don't need to answer that, I know you, dear brother,” he smiled more kindly, “if your attraction was purely sexual, you would not be here at the moment, and we both know it. But you want more than just sex from him. You want a relationship, someone to come home to. It's only natural at your age.”

It was Holmes' turn to raise a disbelieving eyebrow, “I don't remember you getting married seven years ago, Mycroft.”

“I do remember using the word natural, Sherlock. Not unavoidable, but I remember being of the decided opinion that a permanent companion of some sort would be an advantage to me. I never quite got around to it, but the idea was certainly there. Which deviates entirely from the point, and I will thank you not to bother trying that with me.”

“All right then, the point is, what do I do?” Holmes swallowed the last of his brandy, but held up his hand to stop Mycroft pouring another, “if indeed I do wish him to be my lover, which I am not entirely convinced of, I might add, how do I go about it?”

“Use your head, Sherlock. It is not only there for decorative purposes, you know. Has he agreed to meet you to look at those rooms in Baker Street?”

Holmes nodded with a deep sigh, and took to fiddling with a pen on Mycroft's desk.

“Well, there you have it, then. He cannot be utterly repulsed by you, if he is willing to consider you as a housemate, can he?”

“I suppose not. Though that reveals no predisposition towards wanting to bed me, either.”

“And if you were not so caught up in your attraction to him, you could easily have discovered whether or not he had felt the same thing, couldn't you? Would you object to sharing rooms with him, even if he might never share your desire, as you so... interestingly put it, to bed you?”

“Not at all. He seems the sort of man who would get on easily with anyone.”

“Then my suggestion to you is to move in with him – I know you better than to think you will do anything so truly horrendous that he would take the embarrassment of changing his mind after agreeing over having you as a flatmate. I would suggest you try to tone down your charming eccentricities for a while once he moves in, but I also know better than to hope. If he is truly meant for you, mon petit frère, then he will accept it anyway. All you can do, Sherlock, is be yourself.”

Holmes looked at him carefully for a long moment, “that sounded suspiciously like long-worn advice, Mycroft. Surely you have some better insight into the inner mechanics of love?”

“I'm afraid that like all other men, love is as much a mystery to me as it is to you, my dear.”

“Hmm,” Holmes set down the pen he had been playing with and stood up, “thank you, Mycroft. In an odd way, you have been very helpful,” he pushed his chair in and turned to leave.

“One further thing, Sherlock,” the smile in Mycroft's voice was audible even from halfway across the room, “let him see you use your hands as often as possible. A doctor will appreciate them, I'd wager.”

Holmes huffed an incredulous laugh and left his brother's study, mood much improved, and with plans forming in his head.


End file.
